Greetings from Munich! - Europe to the United Kingom - CycleBlaze

April 18, 2025

Greetings from Munich!

Planning, planning, planning

Gutan Tag from Munich, one for our favorite cities. We arrived yesterday on time (around 2 pm on the 18th).  The flights went smoothly and by traveling a day earlier than scheduled we missed a winter storm in Denver threatening to disrupt our flight.  Nobody feels too charitable towards airlines but United was proactive in contacting and allowing us to change flights. So, kudos to them!

Of course, that meant we had a pretty significant scramble getting out of Bend.  Our house sitters arrived after a long drive from NW Arkansas and we just had time to give them a tour of our house and have a nice dinner together.  We don’t usually arrange for house sitters but for such a long trip it made sense. It will avoid calling on neighbors and friends to deal with golf balls through our windows and water leakages etc. These folks sat for friends of ours in Eugene, Oregon a few years ago and they were excited about having the chance to spend the summer in Bend. We feel completely comfortable with them and the house will be in good hands.

Planing this trip was a lot more work than our usual 3 month excursion:  a big part of that is the fact that we are meeting up with numerous friend groups and family and that necessitates committing to being in a certain place at a certain time. A a consequence we have to take a few trains which many previous readers know sends shivers down our spines. When trains work they work great - and when they do not it’s just a debacle.  (I recently was reading the Grampies journal about traveling in Spain this year and they wrote an hilarious entry about planning some train travel on Spanish Medio Distance trains. We can relate. Last year we took one local (Rodales) train in Catalonia due to bad weather. It was only one short train ride but provided some significant and laughable  challenges.) 

The planning was more complicated too because Ireland and the UK (our two primary destinations) supposedly are not all that cycle-friendly. This manifested itself in the planning process because numerous hotels/inns do not want to deal with storing our bikes. This is an issue one we have not had at all in Europe. Nobody ever says no to your bikes.   In contrast I had quite a hard time finding accommodations in Ireland and UK.  An example  (but one roof many) was booking in London: even after I booked a recommended hotel specifically listed  as being cycle friendly they still wrote back to my query on bike storage by saying no,  indeed there was nowwhere to store our bikes. It will be interesting to see if we feel this mild hostility when we are there.  And thanks to the Finneys - whose detailed journal on a recent trip to Ireland provided a number of tips on cycle- friendly hotels. 

Speaking of mild hostility we have had a lot of people ask if we are nervous about traveling in Europe this year given the recent antics of the US government. We are not nervous as we have generally found people don’t associate individual travelers (that would be us) with their country’s policies.  Hopefully that holds true. We had a few more questions than normal at passport control coming into Munich. Of course, the economic impact of the aforementioned antics aren’t helping us; the dollar has continued to slide in the last few weeks, making everything more expensive. Dave is very good about keeping the economics of travel in perspective and he has encouraged me to must shut my eyes,  pay the visa bill and not worry about it! There is no doubt however, that between inflation and the slide of the dollar this trip will be more expensive. 

We concluded our last European cycling trip in July 2024 but we did have one additional signature trip in November. We went to Japan for three weeks in November 2024 and rented bikes in a couple of different places:  we rode the Shimanami Kaido cycling trail along the Seto Inland Sea to Shikoku and back, and also spent a day on bikes in Kyoto. 

We enjoyed a day trip in and around Kyoto on bikes we had rented.
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The Shimanami Kaido trail crosses amazing bridges connecting six islands.
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Scott AndersonYou're right about the Shimanami Kaido. When we've thought about returning to Japan this is always the first place that comes to mind. But you're right about the infrastructure too though - it's definitely not Western Europe, and as fascinating as our tour was it's one of the main reasons we've never gone back.
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1 day ago

Both were great fun but we came away thinking Japan was not a great cycling destination as there is not much cycling infrastructure.  However, the Japanese people are super law-abiding and you wouldn't have much fear of getting run over there on a bike!  The highlight was a 5 day hike we did on the Kumono Kodo trail with our close friends Jeff and Allyson while staying in traditional Japanese Inns (ie: sleeping on a mat on the floor and washing in traditional public bathing  facilities.) When in Rome. . .

Jill on the Kumano Kudo Trail in Japan iin November 2024.
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In any event, we are here in Munich with a free day on our hands due to the earlier than expected travel to Europe. We are shacked up at our usual Novotel Munich City on the east side of the Isar river enjoying the amazing breakfast spread - for us it’s a ten-jammer (in Anderson speak).  We made it in from the Munich airport last evening with minimal logistical challenges except for an extra long train ride into the city due to Jill encouraging us to get on a S train that did get us to our final end point — just not in the most direct way possible.  We went directly from the airport to our public storage unit on Cheimgastrasse, organized our gear into panniers and then rode to our hotel. The joy we feel climbing onto our KTM bikes is palpable. Why we love cycle touring…..

Today's ride: 5 km (3 miles)
Total: 21 km (13 miles)

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Jacquie GaudetI think it was Keith Classen who came up with the “jammer” ratings. See https://www.cycleblaze.com/journals/bigtour2014/history-lesson-in-trier-longuich-to-trier/
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21 hours ago
Scott AndersonTo Jacquie GaudetThat's my belief also. It certainly wasn't us. Neither of us is a jam fan anyway.
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17 hours ago